Content-addressable memories are hardware search engines that are much faster than algorithmic searches. Content-addressable memory cells include a conventional memory cell with additional comparison circuitry. Because content-addressable memory searches the entire memory content they have high power consumption. At the same time leakage current is becoming an increasingly larger component of content-addressable memory power consumption. Accordingly, there exists a need in the art to mitigate the deficiencies and limitations described hereinabove.